What about those plots?

From Power Line, comments on the alleged tortures that allegedly didn't work:

"Detainee's Harsh Treatment Foiled No Plots." That's the front-page headline at the top of today's Washington Post. But the article itself (by Peter Finn and Joby Warrick) suggests that the headline is false. For in the third paragraph we read that, as a result of the harsh interrogation of the one detainee in question (Abu Zubaida) "not a single significant plot was foiled." (emphasis added)

It follows, I assume, that (according to the Post's sources) at least one "insignificant plot" was stopped. And if that is true, then it follows that the interrogations techniques produced at least some reliable information about real plots.

The Post does not define "significant plot." There is, to be sure, such a thing as an insignificant plot. For example, our own CIA is said to have plotted to cause Fidel Castro's beard to fall out. Islamic jihadists, however, are more serious and more bloodthristy than that. Thus, it's difficult to imagine them hatching a terrorist plot that did not involve, as its intended end product, some loss of innocent life.

Much of the Post's article is dedicated to advancing the view that Abu Zubaida was not the important terrorist the U.S. initially thought he was. However, Finn and Warrick have trouble keeping their story straight. At one point, they tell us that Abu Zubaida was merely "a fixer" for "radical Muslim ideologues" (whatever that means) who "ended up working directly with al-Qaeda only after Sept. 11 -- and that was because the U.S. stood ready to invade Afghanistan." Later in the story, however, the authors state that "until the attacks on New York and Wahington, Abu Zubaida was a committed jihadist who regarded the United States as an enemy principally because of its support of Israel." Indeed, he allegedly was linked to the "Millennium Bomber," an al Qaeda member. And whether or not Abu Zubaida worked "directly" with al Qaeda, the Post concedes that he "helped move people in and out of military training camps in Afghanistan, including some men who were or became members of al Qaeda."

If, prior to 9/11, Abu Zubaida was already a committed jihadist who regarded the U.S. as an enemy because it supported Isarel, then why does the Post attribute his decision to work directly with al Qaeda to the fact that the U.S. was about to invade Afghanistan? Isn't it more plausible to assume that he cast his lot with al Qaeda after 9/11 precisely because that outfit had pulled off 9/11? And if Abu Zubaida was moving al Qaeda terrorists in and out of "military" camps, then wouldn't he likely have valuable information about al Qaeda and its members?

The significance of these questions goes beyond the quality of the Post's reporting. If Abu Zubaida's exact status and motivation are still unclear, our government can hardly be faulted for not knowing when it captured him just how much he knew. But the government plainly was not wrong in believing that he possessed potentially valuable information. And it cannot be faulted for not knowing in advance whether obtaining that information would foil significant terrorist plots, "insignificant" terrorist plots, or no plots at all.

The next time we capture an Abu Zubaida (or for that matter a Khalid Sheikh Mohammad), it will be up to the Obama administration to decide, based quite possibly on imperfect information, whether the prisoner is "high value" and, if so, how aggressively to interrogate him. In doing making the call, Obama and his surrogates will not be able to rely on the "insignificant plot" doctrine, however appealing it may be to them as liberal lawyers. For like the Bush administration, they will have no way of making the required assessment in advance.

 

JOHN adds: Marc Thiessen dissects the Post's article further at the Corner.

The Left's assault on the CIA program continues with today's front-page story about the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah: "Detainees Harsh Treatment Foiled No Plots." The story, like so many on this program, is rife with errors and misinformation.

 

For example, the Post states:

Abu Zubaida quickly told U.S. interrogators of [Khalid Sheikh] Mohammed and of others he knew to be in al-Qaeda, and he revealed the plans of the low-level operatives who fled Afghanistan with him. Some were intent on returning to target American forces with bombs; others wanted to strike on American soil again, according to military documents and law enforcement sources. Such intelligence was significant but not blockbuster material. Frustrated, the Bush administration ratcheted up the pressure — for the first time approving the use of increasingly harsh interrogations, including waterboarding.

This is either uninformed or intentionally misleading.

 

In fact, what Abu Zubaydah disclosed to the CIA during this period was that the fact that KSM was the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks and that his code name was "Muktar" — something Zubaydah thought we already knew, but in fact we did not. Intelligence officials had been trying for months to figure out who "Muktar" was. This information provided by Zubaydah was a critical piece of the puzzle that allowed them to pursue and eventually capture KSM. This fact, in and of itself, discredits the premise of the Post story — to suggest that the capture of KSM was not information that "foiled plots" to attack America is absurd on the face of it.

 

The Post also acknowledges that Zubaydah's "interrogations led directly to the arrest of Jose Padilla" but dismisses Padilla as the man behind a fanciful "dirty bomb" plot and notes that Padilla was never charged in any such plot. In fact, Padilla was a hardened terrorist who had trained in al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan, and was a protégé of al Qaeda's third in command, Mohammed Atef. And when he was captured, Padilla was being prepared for a much more sinister and realistic attack on America.

 

In June of 2001, Padilla met in Afghanistan with Atef, who asked him if he was willing to undertake a mission to blow up apartment buildings in the United States using natural gas. He agreed, and was sent to a training site near the Kandahar airport to prepare for the attack under close supervision of an al Qaeda explosives expert, who taught him about switches, circuits, and timers needed to carry it out. He was training in Afghanistan when Coalition forces launched Operation Enduring Freedom. Atef was killed by a Coalition airstrike, and Padilla joined the other al Qaeda operatives fleeing Afghanistan.

....

The Left is desperate to discredit the efficacy of this program, and they have launched a desperate campaign to destroy it. Last week it was the leak of an ICRC document describing some of the techiques allegedly used in the program — one of the most damaging leaks of classified information since the war on terror began because it allows al Qaeda to train against the techniques. And now we have this highly uninformed front-page story in the Washington Post. All of this is incredibly damaging to the security of the United States. And if America is attacked again, those responsible for the disclosure of this information will bear much of the blame.

 And go, read the whole thing.